I woke up screaming.

   The phone rang.

   "Hello!" I shouted.

   There was a pause and a concerned gasp. "Willow?" It was Angel. My
   disoriented gaze flew about the room, searching for Buffy's body while I
   jumped to my feet in sheer panic.

   Oh Goddess, Oh Goddess, Oh Goddess...

   "Angel, I killed Buffy," I sobbed, clutching the phone to my face. It was
   a litany in my mind. 'I killed Buffy, killed Buffy, killed Buffy...'
   Somewhere in my head, someone was laughing. It was not me.

   Angel missed a beat. "I just saw Buffy a few minutes ago," he responded.
   "You haven't had time to kill her if you're picking up the phone in LA," he
   reasoned with neat logic.

   "No, no, no!" I confessed. "My dream, I killed her in my dream! I ripped
   out her throat and drained her dry!"

   "Oh."

   "OH? Is that all you can say? I have sex with your true love, and rip out
   her throat and all you can say is 'OH'?!" It was WAY more information than
   I needed, or meant to provide. OK, so I was a little bit hysterical, a
   little bit unreasonable, and a lot illogical. I had just had the nightmare
   of a lifetime.

   "Willow," Angel's voice grew soothing. "It was just a nightmare. The
   demon is messing with you."

   It was? I thought about it and thought about it again. It had seemed so
   real...so vivid. It was more than a dream. "But!"

   "No buts!" Angel forbade. "It was a dream," he reiterated firmly. "You'll
   probably experience them periodically." My stomach dropped. Periodically?
   Oh joy...

   "Did you have them?" I whispered. "N-nightmares?"

   "All the time," he replied promptly.

   "About killing Buffy?"

   Considerable pause. "Sometimes," he answered guardedly. "I really only
   had explicit dreams about killing Buffy when the First Evil was after me."
   We had just entered The Angel Sensitivity Zone. It is that special place
   defined by anything and everything that has to do with Angel's bloody past
   or vampire nature. Angel goes there when he feels threatened or vulnerable.
   I am going to have to have him make some room for me in his special place.

   "Do you think that the First Evil is attacking me?" I asked.

   "Maybe," he replied. "Dunno." Dunno?!! My what a font of information he
   was!

   "Angel, this is no time to be cryptic or taciturn! I need answers! This
   isn't easy! Especially since you haven't told me what to expect! You never
   said anything about nightmares!" I sounded desperate and panicked but that
   was okay, because I was.

   "I wasn't sure you would have them," he apologized. "I'm sorry." He
   sighed. "Nightmares are one of the ways the demon will torment you. It
   inflicted them on me a lot more in the beginning. Sooner or later, you'll
   harden to them and it will lighten up."

   "How long?" I demanded, gripping the phone like a lifeline. I needed Angel
   and his guidance. It was not just want. It was NEED. I had to have his
   help through this ordeal or I knew that I would not make it. Goddess only
   knows how he did it alone when this happened to him.

   He hesitated. "How *long* Angel?" I repeated.

   "A couple decades..." His words were barely above a whisper so I almost
   did not hear him. They tore another sob of fear and frustration from me.

   "Willow, hush, shh... It'll be OK, I promise. It won't be that long for
   you. We'll find a cure and I'll take my demon back, I promise..." He was
   comfort and succor. I closed my eyes and focused on his gentle voice,
   believing everything he told me, because it was that or go insane.

   I breathed deeply and tried to find my center. "What else will it do to
   me?" I asked. "I'm experiencing fragments of memories...it started
   yesterday after you left." It was such a relief to finally tell someone. I
   had been afraid to tell Cordelia for fear that she would think me nuts.

   "What kinds of memories?" he asked curiously.

   I stuttered. "Of-of killing people, being places in the past. Foreign
   place where people talked and dressed in an old way. I-I even hear
   fragments of conversations in my head sometimes in foreign languages. The
   weird part is that I can understand what's being said. It's just like the
   memories are my own but I know that they're not."

   "Amazing!" Angel exclaimed. "You're perceiving the demon's memories. I
   always recalled them clearly, as if they were my own."

   "These aren't mine," I insisted. My tone was adamant.

   "Good," Angel said. "Hold on to that. No matter how nasty they get, just
   remember that I'm to blame, not you."

   "But you're not," I retorted.

   "What?" He sounded puzzled.

   "Not to blame. These are the demon's memories," I insisted. "Like you
   just said. It has a separate identity, it's just one that you can't
   perceive and I can. You're just like me. An innocent by-stander."

   Angel swallowed, loud enough to be heard. I also heard his teeth gnash and
   an instinctive denial on the tip of his tongue that went unuttered.

   Angel changed the subject and I let him. "The demon will want to kill. It
   will want to drink blood and will fight you for control, especially when
   you're near humans. The easiest thing to do is avoid people."

   "Great," I muttered. "How am I supposed to stop it, Angel?" I asked in a
   small voice.

   "Just say no," he replied flatly. He knowingly--or unknowingly--quoted the
   anti-drug slogan. I did not find it any more convincing now then I did the
   first time I heard it. How can such a complex and difficult matter be
   handled with such a simple-minded solution?

   Angel continued, "No matter what it wants, refuse. The more freedom you
   give it, the more control it gains over you. You have to deny it." I
   performed a quick mental correction. I guess "Just Say No" does work for
   some people.

   "That can't be as easy as it sounds!" I cried. There is no way it would
   work for me. It shames me to admit it, but I am more afraid of the demon
   than I am of killing someone. I am terrified of the close mental contact
   that controlling it so tightly entails.

   I am revolted, horrified, and petrified. What if it drives me insane?
   What if I begin to identify with it the way that Angel does? What if I
   become convinced that its sins are my own and I wind up bearing a lifetime
   of mental scars? I do not want to suffer for something a demon did long
   before I was even born.

   I am such a chicken... Cluck, cluck, cluck...

   "Willow," Angel said sternly. "You can do it. You're strong. I...I was a
   weak, weak person and I managed to."

   I sniffed and hiccupped. "I wish you were here," I whimpered.

   "Do you want me to come home?" he asked. He did not even hesitate to make
   the offer. I am strangely proud of Angel for his willingness to take such
   an awful burden back upon himself. Being alive and free must have been a
   temptation. He shames me with his courage. I feel small and cowardly in
   comparison.

   "Nohicno." I shook my head. "I can do this." I could--and would--be
   brave for him.

   "Good girl," he cajoled. "I know you can."

   We made small talk about nothing in particular for a while, and then Angel
   hung up because he was late for our programming class. I set down the
   phone, feeling lonely and lost again the second he was gone.

   "I can do this," I reassured myself.

   *No You Can't. You're Too Weak To Control Me.*

   I *heard* a voice in my head. The thought was clear and distinct and
   definitely not my own. I panicked and knocked the phone off the table,
   fleeing across the room in sheer terror, running from the VOICE IN MY HEAD.

   There was no escape, no matter how far I ran.

   And it was only the beginning.

   #

   Over the next several hours it...he...spoke to me often. I heard his voice
   in my head, as distinct and clear as a thought. My awareness of his
   presence increased along with the soul-chilling certainty that I AM NOT
   ALONE IN THIS BODY.

   Angelus was a concept before; now he is a reality. To preserve my sanity,
   I am calling the demon 'Angelus'. It is what he calls himself: demon with
   the face of an angel. What was only a peripheral awareness of his presence
   before is suddenly a full-blown waking nightmare.

   To quote Pink Floyd, "There is someone in my head but it is not me..."

   THERE IS A DEMON IN HERE WITH ME.

   I am screaming inside and he is laughing. I am trapped in this head with a
   monster. Let me out! Someone please let me out! Oh Goddess, oh God, oh
   somebody, anybody, please let me out!

   I am Willow. It is Angelus. We are separate.

   I have to cling to the difference between 'Willow' and 'Angelus'. If I do
   not them I will wind up like Angel--unable to distinguish myself the demon.
   I would rather wind up like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, two distinct and
   separate personalities sharing one body, than to have our identities merge.

   This is sheer terror on a scale previously unknown. I have fought monsters
   and demons, and I have never known anything like this before. The demon is
   going to take control away from me. I know it. It senses my weakness and
   knows that I am not strong like Angel.

   For now it is biding its time, feeding on my fear. But the distance
   between us is closing and I am losing myself. Two voices in my head...my
   own and his... We are merging and we must remain apart.

   I am Willow. He is Angelus. We are separate.

   next